Consciousness is best defined as "our mode of access."
All living creatures themselves are best characterized as having "an inside," "an outside," and a semiperiable barrier separting (sort of) the two -- across which active processes (e.g. initally metabolism: anabolism and catabolism) are at work in all living creatures to bring the "right stuff" in and push "the other stuff" out. The above is true for all living things from the tiniest/simplist to the most complex (and this stucture is lacking in things to do not live).
And the "outside" has a "horizonal" structure - there is no defined border - there is always "more/other" that lies beyond. More complex and "advanced" creatures have, pragmatically, an "expanded horizon" (although as some features are gained - other -- eg smell in the case of humans -- do not develop and are even lost -- so there is always "more" or "different." Hence, for us humans - in all sorts of ways our consiousness - our access - can be expanded, contracted, distorted, focused, etc.
But the bottom line holds: CONSCIOUSNESS IS OUR MODE OF ACCESS.
(I will add that in addition to our human "expanded horizon of meaning" we all must "reduce complexity" to make sense of it all... All work for our brain and body... Hence the default state of everyday consiousness is practical and incomplete. But it does get us through the day... And... there is ... always MORE and OTHER....)
Michael,
I try to understand your assumption CONSCIOUSNESS IS OUR MODE OF ACCESS . We need access to manipulate objects (outside) so a representation of such objects has to exist (inside).
I think this is not enough.
We have lots of robots without any consciousness and they manipulate things "outside" but they only have algorithms. If a condition is true they do anything and so on. There is no consciousness. May be there is a hidden secret in the "MODE OF ACCESS"?
I think we get closer to consciousness if we add MEANING and RELATIONSHIP
Wilfried,
I was not referring to general features of "consciousness." I am referring to "human consciousness" ... which I do think can be characterized as "our mode of access."
The phenomenon itself - consiousness -I would assert, arises initially as a property of living things (in contrast to non-living things). Living things differ from non-living things by virtue of their ambiguous boundary/edge - and more specifically by virtue of the processes of anabolism and catabolism. In order to remain alive, they MUST exchage their parts with the world that surrounds them. And hence, what is "me" and what is "not me" also becomes - not only temporally ambiguous, but also a vital project. So, re this vital project, how far out do I go, and when... and where...? Here is an origin of consciousness....
Can we, who are conscious, build some of these processes into a robot? Well yes... we can create a robot that runs on electricity, measures the charge remaining in the battery, and then seeks out mapped out plugs to travel over to and plug into and recharge. Does following this algorithm make them "conscious"? Of course not. They would simply have another property added to their "mode of access." Having a mode of access does not make a thing conscious. They would certainly not have "our mode of access" -- human consciousness. And yes, it is "embodied and enactive and extended - and involves relationships and meaning. But the point that I am making is that our consciouness is "our mode of access."
Michael,
your example with the robot is quite clear but also bacteria are such biological robots. They react to stimuli and that is all. On the staircase of evolution must be a point where the kind of reaction changes qualitatively from meaningful reacting to conscious perception and reflected action, so to consciousness. If we understand this change we will understand consciousness. It is a good idea to talk about the "mode of access" but this expression does not enlighten the process behind. We do not understand more than before.
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